Universities Struggling To Deal With Law Requiring Them To Fight File Sharing

from the what-a-waste dept

For years, Hollywood pushed Congress to pass laws that would hold colleges and universities responsible for cracking down on unauthorized file sharing that happened on campus. The threat was that if universities didn't stop file sharing, Congress could withold federal financial aid funds from students. That's quite a big stick. What justified it? Well, the MPAA put out a report claiming that 44% of "losses" from file sharing came from college campuses. Of course, the number (like so many out of entertainment industry lobbyists) was entirely made up. In fact, it was so ridiculous that even the MPAA came out and publicly admitted the numbers were bogus and apologized!

You would think, after that, Congress would think twice about passing a law that was written based on such bogus numbers. Think again. Congress had no problem rushing it through and getting it signed by the President.

"We have not received one complaint about one student. Yet now we have to go out and incur the cost to solve a problem that we didn't really have.... Tying actually capital and operating dollars to it in this economy to solve a problem we don't really have at our scale has been an issue."

Thanks, Hollywood and all those politicians who approved this. Now you're taking away important resources from our educational institutions for a problem that isn't even a problem.

Piracy increases production @ universities

Okay, so the subject might be a pretty big assumption but this is going on personal experience from my own college. The networking/IT staff at my college is paradoxically anal and apathetic when it comes to the whole piracy issue. We set up a file-sharing system within our campus' dorms so people can grab whatever they need to from people on campus --- movies, music, ebooks, software, etc. --- without having to use up bandwidth that the college itself could use towards more beneficial stuff for both faculty and students. And we're not the only college that does this.

Hell, one of the chief IT staff members at the school even gave the okay for this whole operation ran by a small group of people. The benefits outweigh the risk in the majority of the school's opinion. If they were to take the file sharing system down, productivity of not only the students but the faculty and administration would go down as well. Where's a pirate's thanks in all this? No where to be seen. Taking all this crap for the sake of education? Bug off.

So Wrong

First, why should third parties be required, by law, to protect a company's business model. It's the company's responsibility to implement and protect a workable business model.

Second, implementing this private police force activity will cost the university money. Will the MPAA and the RIAA be providing their fair share of the expense of supporting this police force? If not, isn't the RIAA and the MPAA imposing a financial burden on the students who pay the tuition. So even if a student does not infringe, he or she is forced to pay to protect a company's revenue stream.

Third, LIABILITY. It will happen, some student gets wrongly accused, convicted, and fined without due process and suffers some sort of irreparable harm. The student sues the University and the University looses big time. Meanwhile the executives at the RIAA and the MPAA watch from the sidelines while enjoying their luxury summer palaces saying that this miscarriage of justice is not their responsibility or fault.

Re: So Wrong

This isn't about "protecting a business model." It's about stopping theft. You wouldn't let a bank robber run by you with an armload full of cash, would you? Theft affects everyone, and we all have to do our part to stop theft.

Re: Re: So Wrong

And by the way, how many other things do you think universities should be "doing their part to stop"? There's an obesity problem in America and college cafeterias are not known for their health food, perhaps universities should sink money into doing their part with that? We all need to do our part (it takes a village) to raise moral beings, perhaps universities ought to work on that too.

Re: Re: So Wrong

It is not "theft." It is copyright infringement. There's a universe of difference between the two things. Theft deprives someone of their property. Copyright infringement is a violation of a deal society makes with artists. Corporations violate their part of this deal as routinely and eagerly as anybody sharing with their friends.

Re: Re: Re: Re: So Wrong

You're talking morals, I'm talking the law. We disagree on the ethics of the situation, that's fine. The law is pretty objective on this count, though. Each activity breaks a different law, ergo they are different crimes.

"If you have something you didn't pay for, then you stole it."

This, of course, is where we differ ethically. I don't pay for a lot of things I never stole, even you would agree with this.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: So Wrong

The only things that you didn't pay for that you also didn't steal are things given to you for free. If you just took them, you stole them.

Music has a price. if you didn't pay the price, well, how did you get it? Did it magically appear in front of you? Nope. You went and got it. You didn't pay. Therefore... well, you can figure out the rest.

yes, it is a moral issue, and a legal one. When we become numb to the idea of "petty theft", it isn't long before we become numb to pretty much all the other crime.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: So Wrong

"The only things that you didn't pay for that you also didn't steal are things given to you for free. If you just took them, you stole them."

I almost agree, but that's not what you originally said, and I think your original statement was telling of the attitude you actually have. Steal has a specific definition, as does infringement. Are they different? Absolutely, pretending they aren't is disingenous, as there are very physical, very important differences. Are they both wrong by most definitions of morality? Nearly absolutely, and only nearly because questions of morality are so culturally relative. Does one do more harm than the other? Definitely, hence the reason one is a criminal matter, and the other civil.

"Music has a price."

False premise. Not ALL music has a price. Over-generalizations lose you credibility. There are all kinds of free shows, free downloads, etc.

"yes, it is a moral issue, and a legal one."

True, to you and I. But the music industry ought not be concerned with morality. They're job is to make money. If the industry could make more money utilizing FREE! concepts, who cares about morality? Listening to music label executives, particularly any that had any part of Jazz/Blues music years ago, makes the hair stand up on my neck. Some of the abuses they carried out against their "client" artists were LEGENDARY.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: So Wrong

The only things that you didn't pay for that you also didn't steal are things given to you for free. If you just took them, you stole them.

Still not true. I wasn't 'given' the air I breathe. This is a technical issue, however. The music *was* given to me for free, by people who bought that music with their hard-earned money.

Music has a price. if you didn't pay the price, well, how did you get it? Did it magically appear in front of you? Nope. You went and got it. You didn't pay. Therefore... well, you can figure out the rest.

Are you implying that I broke into the artist's home (or hacked into their private servers) and stole their music? That would be wrong in several ways. Someone *shared* their music with me, of their own free will. They either bought the music, or received it from someone else sharing with them.

So, yes, the music *was* given to me at no charge. That's what sharing is all about. You learned all about this in kindergarten, try and keep up.

yes, it is a moral issue, and a legal one. When we become numb to the idea of "petty theft", it isn't long before we become numb to pretty much all the other crime.

It is indeed a moral issue. Sharing with others is a moral good. Telling someone else they aren't allowed to share what they legitimately bought is a moral wrong. When we become numb to the idea of "sharing with others", it isn't long before we become numb to pretty much all other acts of charity and kindness.

The legal aspect is indeed slightly inconvenient at the moment, but law moves slower than culture. It'll change in time, as the current set of laws were designed to protect the little guy from corrupt publishers; no one thought in their wildest dreams that one day the little guy could publish as well or better than the big guys, and the corrupt publishers would be able to twist the law around to use as a weapon against the little guy. We all do our part to raise the cultural consciousness surrounding this issue to ensure that the law gets restored to benefit the little guy again.

(As a sidenote, the idea that file-sharing is a gateway drug to raping and murdering is pretty much the most hilarious fucking thing I've ever heard.)

Re: Re: Re: Re: So Wrong

"If you have something you didn't pay for, then you stole it. You can call it infringing or sharing or whatever, but your momma will tell you, whatever you have that you didn't pay for you stole."

Not MY mama, my friend. But here are some things she DID say:

1. The best things in life are free (refutes the theory that ANYTHING you have that you didn't pay for you must have stolen)
2. Money can't buy you love (refutes the idea that money is the all encompassing motivator)
3. Sharing is caring (refutes the idea that sharing something I have with another human being is a bad/immoral thing)
4. Anything worth having is worth working for (refutes the idea that people or companies should be valued if they haven't actually PRODUCED anything)
5. Hard work will pay off in the end (refutes the idea that people/companies should be perpetually paid without perpetually working, also refutes hand-me-down and/or legacy patents/IP rights)

Re: Re: Re: Re: So Wrong

So when a robber runs by your house with a wad of cash, should you be held responsible?

How about when walmart buys a toy for 1 cent, and sells it for a dollar, and you have no way to JUST give a cent to the producer, is it wrong to steal it if you already support the producer. Music is the same way in that the creator makes nothing.

The way the RIAA has it, the creator makes nothing. So i went to a linkin park concert, paid my $60 in tickets and bought 2 T-shirts. Then, I went home and pirated the music. You call that stealing? Id call it getting what I pay for. I bet you are all for the RIAA getting cuts of concert and radio too. Thats just sick.

Re: Re: So Wrong

First, why should I be respect a law that takes away some of my rights and gives additional rights to someone else? The law should provide a level playing field that protects everyone.

Second, how far can a law go in "protecting" someone's property? Are companies allowed to have jack booted thugs invade your home at their will to "investigate" if you may be using a product in a manner inconsistent with how the company says is an acceptable use. How about allowing store owners to strip search each customer as they leave the store.

Third, can you impose a law that requires a third person, who is a "bystander" to forcefully intervene to protect Person A from Person B? Or to put it this way; hypothetically, you are on your way to work and I am going to a movie. I stop you and say that according to this new law I require that you to stand here and protect my car while I am in the movie. Well if you don't go to work, you don't get paid, you may even get fired. So are you willing to sacrifice your time and money to protect Person A? I don't think so.

Fourth, we also need to ask the question as to whether Person A even has a legitimate ownership interest to the property in question. It is quite possible that I could be asking you in my hypothetical example to protect a stolen car. Third disinterested parties are not in a position to determine who is or who is not stealing. So how can we demand that a disinterest third party protect the interest of Person A over Person B?

It is the responsibility of Person A to protect their own property. If he/she can't too bad.

Re: So Wrong

lets set up the CMAA to bill the RIAA and MPAA for these services. Get a bunch of universities to join. Then bill the RIAA and MPAA and keep all the money for ourselves because we cant find the Univesities that we represent.....

..... turn about ... fair play .... BIG OL GRIN

Hephaestus Chairman and CEO CMAA
(College Music Association of America)

More going on here deserving investigation....

Mike,

I recommend running a FOIA on GAO to find the P2P University audit job that was killed by Congress when the poll results came back unfavorable to the content industry. There are some evil things happening in this area and deserve more investigation. Why was the GAO investigation suddenly killed on this? It was a job that was going on for more than 2 years that suddenly disappeared. If you need me to email you just post under this...but I just gave you a big lead on something you need to see to believe...someone please get these records public...

Re: More going on here deserving investigation....

Re: More going on here deserving investigation....

I recommend running a FOIA on GAO to find the P2P University audit job that was killed by Congress when the poll results came back unfavorable to the content industry. There are some evil things happening in this area and deserve more investigation. Why was the GAO investigation suddenly killed on this? It was a job that was going on for more than 2 years that suddenly disappeared. If you need me to email you just post under this...but I just gave you a big lead on something you need to see to believe...someone please get these records public...

At least these counter measures have a beneficial side effect. It should do nicely to create some more competent computer engineers (as they learn to bypass these systems) and some lawyers and politicians with reasonable views on copyright (as they get angry at the overbearing restrictions sapping away from their education).

Re:

re:so wrong

music is given away 24 hours a day 7 days a week 365+ days a year...100% legal and available to everyone. it's called a "RADIO".. if i wish to listen to music it is my choice what media i use.. the internet is today's radio... file sharing is an artists best promotion of the work they create . it has been proven repeatedly that file sharing leads to more sales not less and a more widespread recognition of talent than any other media. times change,live with it....

Congressmen don't think. Why should when they have friendly lobbyists to do that for them. So much graft and so little time, can't be bothered by details. I'm late for a meeting with a consultant ( my whore ), gotta run.

What I don't understand is this: The traffic shaping tools are already available, it is easy enough (technology wise) to kill of torrent traffic (internal and external), and the costs aren't out there - if anything, the schools might lower their overall bandwidth usage and require less network buildout to make their stuff run.

Why is this such a major issue? The story talks about an atypical university that apparently has had no issues with file sharing - but what would happen if the story was about, I dunno, Cal-State or any of the other major universities that are cesspools of copyright violations. I guess it's easy to slam the RIAA but really, really, hard to slam writers who use non-typical situations to try to make things look different from reality.

Re:

Killing all torrent traffic is not just preventing copyright infringement, it is preventing many legitimate uses of content delivery through torrents. For one good example see http://torrent.fedoraproject.org/ which serves to distribute the free operating system through torrents and is a major cost savings to the project because willing participants donate bandwidth to support the project.

Blocking torrent traffic blindly would be an ignorant misuse of tools with detrimental side effects, not a simply deployment of available tools to fix a real problem.

Re: Re:

What percentage of torrent traffic is legal? Answer: Not much. You can point at a few things, but really, not much.

Commercial companies should just offer downloads and pay the costs to do it.

"For one good example see http://torrent.fedoraproject.org/ which serves to distribute the free operating system through torrents and is a major cost savings to the project because willing participants donate bandwidth to support the project."

They can donate a few dollars and buy some bandwidth instead. No big deal (and the downloads would be much faster).

Sorry, but your argument fails - plus how many university students happen to need a copy of fedora right now?